True Color
by abrynne
Summary: The 2nd adventure of the Alice Crown and Ten series. The Doctor reunites with Alice after four months but they end up going on an adventure of their own that includes Captain Jack, a new backwards alien race, and an accident that handicaps them both.
1. Chapter 1 Music and Noise

Note - This is the second adventure in this series. Please read The Long Brown Coat, the first adventure, before starting this one :)

Chapter 1 – Music and Noise

After a little while, maybe a few weeks, or a month, I realized that the event, my little adventure with the Doctor was something that could only happen once in my lifetime. Because of that, I felt lucky along with a little sadness because I also felt that I'd never have such as good a friend for the rest of my life as he'd been in that short time . The Doctor probably happened across hundreds of people all the time, wherever he went. Some he may see again, others are just there at the same time or they happened to need him for something. The latter was me and I eventually convinced myself that was all.  
From the day he left me I took what life I had and moved on, as I always had before I met him. I went back to work at the bank. After a month, I finished my first short story about a mysterious stranger in a long brown coat. It was accepted and published in a literary magazine. I had become an author.

After two months I was promoted to payroll at the bank which provided me with my own office and a tiny little office window, also of my very own.  
Teddy was always there. He'd become the manager up at the front of the office. Jordan ended up finding a higher up position as an office manager or something. I still think he was bitter about his car because Teddy never confessed to doing anything to it. It is difficult to admit to doing something you don't remember doing. (If you wanted to get technical, the Doctor's the one who broke the blasted thing.)  
Though Teddy knew my feelings on the matter of him and me we ended up going out quite a lot with mates or just the two of us. I knew he wanted it to be more serious because of what the Culraith had said. But again, Teddy had no memory of ever telling me how he felt.

I thought of the Doctor as little as I could because all it would bring up in my head was our discussion of fear. I wanted to kick myself because I proved him right by refusing to go with him out of fear. He and his ship were the most wondrous things I'd ever encountered and most likely, nothing I ended up seeing afterwards would ever match up.  
With all of that though, my head was clear and I was happy with my simple life.

--

Four months had passed after the Doctor's ship had faded away.  
I was in my office on a Friday afternoon, waiting maddeningly for the five o'clock hour so I could go home. I was behind in my work. Papers were strewn about my desk and I was hovering over them anxiously when I got a call on my desk phone. It was Teddy telling me that someone wanted to speak with me. I told him I was very busy – no that wasn't just a lame excuse – that he should tell the individual to come back at another time.

"Alice, I think you'll want to see him," Teddy said.  
I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. I could feel a headache coming on. "Alright then, send him back."  
"He's already on his way."  
I growled a thank you and hung up the phone. Probably someone from human resources coming to do a surprise inspection or something horrible like that. I got to my feet and smoothed out my skirt, hoping I still looked somewhat presentable, and went to my file cabinets in the corner of the office. I began going through them to make sure they were still organized.

A knock sounded on my open office door.  
"Come in and have a seat, I'll be with you in just a minute," I said, my head bent over the open drawer of the cabinet. There was a small blur at the corner of my eye as whoever it was took the seat in front of my desk.  
"Thanks, but I've only got a question for you," the voice was too familiar.

I couldn't see the files anymore. It sounded like he'd propped his feet up on my desk but I couldn't look. I was terrified to look because if I was wrong…  
A pair of red lace up trainers rested on my desk. I saw them just at a side glance. It couldn't be him. He'd worn white ones. But good heavens it certainly sounded like him. I finally gave in and turned around.

The Doctor sat reclining comfortably with the same playful smile on his face and the glint in his brown eyes. His suit was a shocking royal blue pinstripe. But it was perfect for him. "Hello," he said happily.  
I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time but I compromised by standing there and smiling like a loon.

"Oh, come here," he said and got back to his feet and came towards me, scooping me up in a great bear hug.  
I held him tightly and laughed as the random dormant memories of his resurfaced in my mind. I'd almost forgotten that I had them.  
"Aw, did you miss me?" he said.  
We pulled apart and I shook my head, "Not in the slightest."

"You cut your hair," he said with a raise of his eyebrows.  
I automatically ran my fingers through my short cropped hair cut and smiled. "Do you like it?"  
The Doctor took me by the shoulders, his eyes intently studying the top of my head. He turned me around to see the back until I made a complete 360.  
"It suits you actually," he said.  
"Well, after everything that happened, with that thing inside my head I couldn't stand my hair anymore. I don't know why but it feels a lot better this way."  
He looked curiously at me for a moment.

"I like the suit," I said smiling at the red shoes.  
He brightened up again, "I wasn't sure about it at first, really," he said scratching his head. "But one does get tired of brown."  
"It looks tighter," I said suspiciously.  
"It's just the color," he said with a shrug.

"How'd you get back here?" I said as he sat back down and I leaned on my desk.  
"Oh well, by my flawless charm and wit…and Teddy let me through."

I folded my arms in front of me and studied him, "You're not just back for a visit, are you?"  
"Partially, yes. And I really do have a question for you," his eyes lifted up to the ceiling and he folded his hands in front of him. "There's this particular memory of yours that's been cropping up in my head lately. It involves you of course, a public toilet, and a girl who could easily pass for a human crilatain. It ends with you getting all wet." He looked at me expectantly as my face reddened, not out of embarrassment but out of irritation.  
"I'd rather you draw your own conclusions, thank you very much," I growled.  
"Whoa, now! No need to get touchy. I'd rather hear it from you, that's all," he said, the smile off of his face.

"Theresa Blindt enjoyed dunking my head in the toilet at school for getting higher marks in my classes when we were children,"  
The Doctor's face slowly turned into a scowl like a protective older brother, "She humiliated you because you're clever?"  
I shrugged, "I couldn't think of any other reason she did it. I never did anything to her. Is that _really_ why you came back here?"

"Partially, again," he said, his eyes returning to their brightness. He reached into his blue jacket pocket and pulled out a rolled up magazine, "I have a story I think you should hear." He unrolled the magazine and thumbed through the pages, "It's actually quite captivating for a first time author." He found the page he was looking for, "Ah, here it is – "  
I braced myself.

"_The Man in the Long Brown Coat_," he read aloud calmly, but I recognized that mischievous expression on his face. "Very mysterious sounding, don't you think?"  
I rolled my eyes, "Am I in trouble or what? Are you angry with me?"  
He looked perfectly taken aback as though the suggestion offended his very being, "Why would I be angry?"

"Because –" I pointed a finger at him, "You know full well that story is about you…well a two dimensional young adult version of you anyway."  
"Whew, you're paranoid! I could extract the paranoia from you and fill an entire mental hospital with it." He got to his feet and took me by the shoulders, lowering me into the chair while he sat on my desk. "I wanted to tell you in person how brilliant I think this is," he waved the magazine at me. "I especially love the way you describe him.

He read aloud, "_When I met his eyes he didn't flinch for a moment but only continued looking – studying. The eyes were dark and endless. They held a beauty and a horror, the most fiery hate and the sweetest kind of love along with what I believed to be entire galaxies and universes being created and destroyed one second after another. I witnessed all of this just behind the warm brown colored eyes and what seemed to be the face of a handsome young man."_

I'd found the pattern in the carpet extremely interesting as he read it. I felt far from brilliant and more like a fool for not realizing that he'd stumble upon it sooner or later.  
"I admit, I blushed the first time," he said with a grin. "It's near poetry, Alice."  
"Thanks," I said sheepishly.

A car alarm went off outside, smashing the silence with its loud squeal.  
"You didn't want me to read it," he said, looking disappointed.  
"No, of course not. I just didn't think you'd be interested is all."  
The Doctor chuckled as he rolled up the magazine, "You're kidding, right? I couldn't resist when I saw your name on there. Of course I found it in a list of other short stories by different authors – some haven't even written their stuff yet – and I traced it here, back to you," he grinned as though he'd accomplished a great feat.

Two more car alarms went off at the same time. The first one was still blaring. I glared at the window and the Doctor stood to his full height. "Lots of motor thefts in these parts?"  
I shook my head, "No, it's been happening a lot lately around the neighborhood," I stopped myself.

It had been happening for nearly two weeks. I hadn't been able to sleep through the night without a bloody car alarm going off. "That's a bit odd, isn't it?" I looked at him. He was peering out of my small office window. "I never thought on it before now but it has been happening a lot lately. A few days ago my neighbor's burglar alarm went off and they never found anyone or anything that set it off."

"It's happening with anything that has a power source?" he asked me, still gazing out the window.  
"No…just things that make lots of noise," I said.  
He snickered and looked at me with those excited eyes of his and a small smile. "Fancy punching out early?" he said as he pulled out the...sonic screwdriver from his inside pocket.

I glanced at the work on my desk then back at the Doctor. I'd been prepared for this. For four months, I knew what I was going to say if by some slim chance I'd have the opportunity to go with him again. But the fear kicked in first. "You don't really need me, do you?"  
He seemed to deflate a little, "Well, you never know. I could use an extra pair of hands or someone to distract the blood sucking creature while I save the world but it's up to you," he said nonchalantly.

I moved back around my desk, trying to keep from smiling. "Out," I pointed to the door as I opened on of the desk drawers.  
"No need to be rude, Alice. I was only asking," he said, taking small steps backwards towards the doorway. Another alarm went off.  
I took out a pair of jeans, a shirt, and my sneakers from the desk drawer and smiled at him, "I know you were which is why I'm going with you. It'll be easier to keep up with you without the skirt, don't you think?"  
I pushed him the rest of the way out into the corridor. "You keep a change of clothes in the office?" he said, sounding amused. "We really should confront that paranoia."

I shut the door.  
"I'll just wait outside, shall I?" his voice came through the door.  
"I'll be just a minute," I called back as I slipped my skirt off and put on the much more comfortable pair of jeans and sneakers.

After I shoved all of the paper work into my desk drawers and locking my office door, I went to the lobby and met Teddy there. I asked him to tell anyone who asked that I went home early with a massive migraine and that I'd see him later.  
Teddy held me in place by taking hold of my arm, "Are you sure about him? You haven't seen him for months, then he suddenly shows up and you're off like a light. You hardly know him."  
"Don't worry Teddy," I gave him a peck on the cheek. "I trust him. I'll be back soon." I did my best to keep from smiling as I spoke. Teddy was basing what he thought of the Doctor on the fact that he believed him to be a human being. If Teddy knew the entire truth he'd have chained me to my desk.

I went out into the open air and walked to the back car park where my car was and in the space next to it was a blue wooden police box. I smiled in happy recognition like it was a long lost friend I had dearly missed. I ran up to my car and dumped my work clothes in the back seat.  
"Come and have a look," I turned and the Doctor's head was poking out the door of the TARDIS. I've identified it as a low band energy signal, definitely not from around these parts," he said as I slung my bag over my shoulder and he held the door open for me.

"It's coming from a long way off which is why the signal is so weak. But," he said as he leaped back up to the TARDIS console, "right now it's strong enough we can still track it down."  
I took a seat next to the circular console as he continued working, "Is someone calling for help?" I asked.

He looked at me from behind the large power chamber, "Too soon to tell yet. The signal is weak but still strong enough to set off your every day electronic gadgets. It's just the noise makers that I can't figure out." He stared at the computer monitor and grinned, "Got it!" Cranks were turned and switches were flipped as the sound of the ship's engine started up. It rumbled but remained steady. I couldn't feel us moving anywhere. All I could tell is that the ship was just making a bunch of noise. The engine died down again.

"Well, not much for your first trip. We're just outside Cardiff."  
"Cardiff," I said probably too harshly.  
"That's where the signal is. It's at the strongest point about a block away." He pulled out the blue light…sonic screwdriver and went for the door, "Off we go then," he said as though we were going to an afternoon picnic.

We stepped out onto a street corner. Warehouses and more warehouses lined the block we were on. All of them were two or three stories high, large and unimpressive rectangular buildings.  
"Come on, this way," the Doctor nodded his head, holding the screwdriver out in front of him.

I had to move at a jogging pace nearly to keep up with his long strides. We covered one side of the street, turned a corner and started down another nameless street. I slowed down a little and looked around me, "Can you hear music?" I said.  
It was very faint at first but the more I concentrated on it the louder it became. It was beautiful! The Doctor stopped several yards in front of me and looked back, "What kind of music?"  
"I've never heard anything like it before," I said, trying to search for the words. "It's light, airy, sad and beautiful but so soft." I walked slowly up to him, pricking my ears for the lovely song.

The Doctor furrowed his brow and took my hand, "Come on," he said. He led me inside on of the warehouses. This one was only partially full of boxes and chests. The music became louder.  
I pulled on the Doctor's arm, "Can you hear it? It's gorgeous." I smiled vaguely at him and the corners of his mouth lowered into a frown.  
But he said nothing and we kept moving through the stacks of boxes and junk.

"I hear it now," the Doctor said, though he didn't sound like he appreciated it very much.  
"Isn't it lovely?" I said dreamily.  
"Yes, quite," he said sharply.  
I closed my eyes and listened contentedly.

"No, Alice!" the Doctor shook me. "Try to ignore it," he said after I opened my eyes.  
"But you don't know what it is," I protested.  
"Which is highly inconvenient," he said.

We walked deeper into the storage. The warehouse seemed larger than I would have guessed from the outside. But I knew we were getting closer, "It's getting louder."  
"We're almost there," the Doctor held out the sonic screwdriver and we stepped together into a corner made of stacked boxes but there was no time to look around.

The music was no longer soft and soothing. The melody had not changed but it was loud, harsh and pounding in my head. I put my hands to my ears and screamed, falling to my knees. The Doctor must've heard it too. He was shouting something over the music. A flash of blue light consumed the both of us and the small corner we were in.


	2. Chapter 2 Switched

Chapter 2 - Switched

I think I blacked out for just a moment afterwards. When I opened my eyes again the first thing that hit me was the ache I felt from hitting the floor. My body was so strange and bendy. I lay face down on the cold concrete floor and let out a groan but heard a low rumble in my throat which I didn't recognize as my voice. I opened my eyes. There was nothing but a stack of boxes in front of me. Slowly, I pulled my arms up to push my body off of the floor. But the hands that came into my vision weren't mine. The fingers were long and flexible, the palms broad, and the backs had long dark hairs below the knuckles. I stared at them after I sat up and saw the blue cuffs around my wrists. My eyes scanned down to my legs and feet. I was wearing a blue pinstripe suit with red lace up trainers. I quickly put the hands that weren't mine to my face. Sideburns! Sideburns and stubble on my cheeks and chin along with bushy eyebrows. I closed my eyes and tried not to panic. The hairline was weird and just after that my fingers lost themselves in thick hair on the top of my head.

Someone groaned next to me and I turned with staring eyes. My body lay just where I had been standing only moments before. I shook my head and blinked. In the silence I could actually hear the rhythm of two separate heart beats and I knew instinctively that they were both mine.  
I crawled over to my body and hesitated, my hand hovering over the shoulder that was once mine. How could this have happened?! I tried my best to control my breathing as another groan in _my voice_ came from my lips and I watched Alice Crown's body turn over and her eyes opened.

She sat up immediately, "Alice?"  
Our eyes met which was a completely new experience. I was looking into my own eyes and I knew then the Doctor was looking into his.  
"Doctor, what happened?" my voice – the Doctor's voice squeaked in terror as I spoke with it.

He got to my feet instantly and I stood as well. I was much higher off of the ground. I was awkward and lanky and I felt a sudden fear of heights. He held up my hands, "Now, don't panic, Alice – oh the voice…my hands." He exclaimed. "They're so delicate and…how do you stand being so short?" He looked down and put his hands on his new waist and hips, "That's just weird."  
I put my hands to my face in frustration, "Doctor, _how could this have happened?_" my voice shook. "I have hair growth on my face and an Adams apple!"

"Did you have a mirror on you?" he asked me. I couldn't _stand_ hearing my voice talking to me!  
"In the jeans pocket," I said. "It shouldn't be physically possible to be this thin." I said. "I can see the front and back of myself at the same time!"  
He pulled out my compact and opened it up, "Yeah…there's a little more substance than I'm used to," he observed.

"Oi!" I yelled angrily. "That's my body you're talking about. And by the way it's much better than this skinny gangly thing of yours," I flapped the long arms about and nearly lost my balance. "How do you walk with feet this big?"  
"Oi, that's enough. Calm down, Alice. I'll figure this out," he ran my hands through my hair. "Hm, at least the hair's about the same."  
"Yeah, and there's much more of it now."

He patted the pockets of the jeans and walked up to me, stuffing my hand into the inside jacket pocket of his suit that I wore and pulled out the sonic screwdriver. "I knew I'd stowed it before hand." He put his other hand in the outside jacket pocket and pulled out the glasses I'd seen him wear. But he put them over my eyes.  
"Hold on," I said roughly, still adjusting to the sound that came out as I spoke. I took the glasses off of my face and put them onto the Doctor's. I blinked a few times and took them off again, then put them back on. "You don't even need these!" I said looking down at the now scowling woman that was the Doctor.  
I laughed as I took them off and handed them back to him.

"Serious situation here, Alice – body switching is not a common occurrence. I don't care what you've heard," he pointed the sonic screwdriver at me scoldingly.  
"There's obviously not much fun in it," I replied.

The Doctor started walking out of the box corner we were in. I hurried over to follow him, refusing to let him (her) out of my sight while I was walking around in his body. I didn't get very far. I stumbled and fell to the floor in a mess of arms and legs.  
"_Please_ be careful with that body while you have it. I've grown quite fond of it actually," he said as he helped me up. My sanity was nearly gone as I continued listening to my voice telling me what to do.  
"Where are we going?" I asked as he helped me up.  
"Back to the TARDIS. It's not safe outside for either of us while we're like this."

I staggered behind him, getting the knack of the long legs and big feet but I still had to go slower than normal.  
The Doctor seemed to have grasped the control of his new body much better than me. He ran around a corner in the maze of storage. I listened to the step of my shoes to keep track of him as I gingerly stepped along a perfectly flat and even surface. My progress was getting more and more impressive until I heard a scream in my voice and a crash. I broke into a run and met the floor again. But rather than lay there and contemplate my situation I scrambled to my feet and started again until I heard voices.

"_Jack!_" the Doctor said, making my voice screech, "What in blazes are you doing here?"  
"Hello there," said a smooth and flirtatious male voice. He sounded American. "I don't think I caught your name, Blue Eyes."  
"Oh no," the Doctor groaned.

"Sorry for crashing into you like that – I wouldn't mind it if you wanted to try it again though. Are you hurt?"  
"Jack, if you touch me again I swear I will spend the rest of my waking hours finding a way to shorten your life span," the Doctor said harshly.  
"I like the spirit," Jack replied. He always sounded as though he were smiling as he spoke.

After a slow effort I stumbled successfully into a corridor where they had apparently run into each other. "Sorry," I said breathlessly. "I fell over again." The man who I assumed to be Jack saw me and his face immediately lit up in a broad and strikingly handsome smile. "Hello," I said stupidly.  
There was something strange about him most definitely. When he looked at me I just wanted to giggle.

"Doctor – "  
"Er, sorry but that would be him – her right there," I pointed at the disgruntled looking Doctor. He was leaning against the wall, his arms folded in front of him. I never realized how pouty my face could look until I saw it in front of me. "I'm Alice, by the way," I said with a cheesy grin.

Jack's eyes flitted between the both of us for a couple of seconds, his face in a frown of concentration. The Doctor rolled my eyes as I stood rooted to the spot where I wasn't falling over. Jack pointed a finger at me, "Alice," he said.  
I smiled and nodded as Jack slowly began to understand what was going on. He apparently already knew the Doctor which is why he didn't appear surprised.  
He approached me, a sly grin on his face. He was rather tall, but so was the Doctor which made us eye level with each other. Jack took my hand and shook it, "Captain Jack Harkness," he placed his finger under my chin and winked.  
"Alice Crown," I said in a fluttery voice…well, as fluttery as the Doctor's voice could be.

"Stop it," the Doctor said warningly.  
I peered over Jack's shoulder and scowled at the Doctor, "If I want him to stop, I'll say so thank you very much," I looked back at Jack and smiled again.  
"I'll thank you," the Doctor said stepping forward. "not to allow him to touch _my_ body without my permission." It was amazing how intimidating the Doctor could physically make me appear. He walked over to us and stood between myself and Jack, pointing his finger harshly up at him, "I may not be in there right now but I will find a way to end your life if you don't stop it right now."  
Jack laughed but took a step back, "It's good to see you again, Doctor."

The Doctor scowled and took my hand. It was like holding a doll's hand when I wrapped my fingers around it. He pulled me back outside, Jack just behind us.  
"That's something you definitely don't see every day, a full personality switch," Jack said, matching his stride with mine as the Doctor dragged me along. "Do you know how it happened?"  
"I have an idea," the Doctor muttered. "Do you still hear the music, Alice?"  
I pricked my ears and listened hard. All I could hear was our foot falls on the pavement, "No, it's gone."

The Doctor nodded and turned a corner. The TARDIS was at the end of the road. "Key is in your pocket," the Doctor said.  
I patted my blue trouser pockets and found a small silver key. The Doctor snatched it from me without a word and unlocked the wooden door.  
"You could be a little nicer," Jack said after him.

"He's been grouchy ever since it happened," I said, realizing then that I already liked Captain Jack. "I don't think he likes being shorter than everybody else."  
Jack grinned beautifully as we filed into the TARDIS. I walked carefully up the ramp to the main level. Jack leaped up next to the Doctor and started work right along side him. I couldn't take my eyes off of the Doctor for a minute. Watching my body move around the TARDIS controls like it knew what it was doing was incredibly surreal. I sat down and rubbed my bruised knee from when I'd fallen for the third time.

"Ugh," I heard my voice grumble. "These hands are too small. And I keep walking and walking and I still can't seem to get to where I need to go." The Doctor was staring at the monitor on the console. "Short people must use a lot more energy with all of the extra steps." He was talking to Jack who nodded in agreement.  
"Hello, I'm in the room," I said, taking closer look at the Doctor's hands. The fingers were thin and long but very strong. The way they felt was simply that there was too much of them.  
The Doctor sighed and seemed to calm himself a little, "I'm sorry."

"There's no signal anymore. It's just vanished," Jack said.  
"Ah, but look there." The Doctor perked up and pointed to something on the screen. "Alice and I must have interfered with it when we found the point of origin. There's a trace." His brow furrowed at what he was seeing. "It wasn't a signal at all. It was a scanning device of some sort." He stared at the monitor, putting the spectacles over my eyes again.  
Jack looked confusedly back at me and I shrugged helplessly.

'That's it," the Doctor proclaimed, messing up my hair. "Alice, we got in the beam's path. As powerful as it was it started to drain us of our very minds, the greatest kind of power – a sort of life force. I blocked it and reversed the output of the energy field but it seems that on the way back, our brains chose the wrong bodies by mistake."  
"Oh, goodie," I said.

"Can it be reversed?" Jack asked.  
"Probably," the Doctor said, scratching the back of his head. "I'll need to find the power source first. There are only traces of the signal we ran into."  
"It didn't come from Earth, that's for sure. I was tracking it and that's how I ran into you." Jack sat down next to me.

My eyes lit up as I realized what they were saying, "We're going to a different planet?" I looked at the Doctor excitedly despite my current predicament.  
"Looks that way," the Doctor said as he punched buttons. I don't think I ever appeared so clever as I did when the Doctor had control of my body. "There we go – off again."

The TARDIS started up again. I looked around and realized that there were no windows in the ship. I was on my feet trying to find anything that would allow me to see to the outside when the Doctor got my attention. He took my hand and led me down the ramp to the two wooden doors. He opened them up and stepped aside.

My breath left me as I stared unblinkingly at the world below me and the endless blackness of space surrounding the rest of the area around the ship. It was as though I'd found myself in the middle of a film. But this was real. This was me, Alice Crown, trapped in the body of a Time Lord and staring at her home planet from orbit.  
"Alice Crown," the Doctor said with a smile. "Meet the Universe."  
I sighed slowly as I took all of it in. "I'm still breathing," I said.  
"You're still in the TARDIS," the Doctor explained.

"Puts everything in perspective, doesn't it?" Jack said in my ear.  
I nodded unable to convey any proper emotion that could accurately express how I felt. I was humbled most definitely, but terrified and overjoyed all at the same time.  
"Here it comes," the Doctor muttered pointing to the curved blue horizon of the Earth.  
The edge turned white, then crimson and orange-gold until the sun breached the horizon in a ball of blazing white and yellow light. It looked like the light from it burned and seared through the atmosphere but it was only the Earth welcoming and reflecting the light.  
I nearly jabbed myself in the eye as I dried the tears from my cheeks because I still hadn't gotten used to the Doctor's long fingers.

"I wish this could be under different circumstances but that can't be helped," the Doctor pulled me back in and shut the door. "The signal couldn't have come from too far away but it's already fading." He was saying as I walked dreamily back to my seat.  
"I've got the coordinates," Jack said. "They're not exact but they should get us in the general vicinity."  
"Right then – ow!" the Doctor yelped as he pulled my hand from the console and began sucking on a dainty finger.  
"You alright?" Jack was immediately beside him.  
"Just fine – it's the small hands."

I was still on too much of a high to be offended by his remark at the moment.  
"Here we go," the Doctor said as the sound of the TARDIS died down once again.  
Jack and the Doctor huddled around the computer monitor. I unsteadily joined them, peering over my own shoulder.

"We've triggered an intruder alert. The signal came from a ship, not a planet," the Doctor was muttering as though to himself. "It's massive! And here comes our escort."  
Three very large and very armed men prowled around a corner and pointed their weapons at the TARDIS door.


	3. Chapter 3 The Gynil

Chapter 3 – The Gynil

Jack and I watched the computer monitor as the Doctor opened the TARDIS door and stepped out. The security guards stared at the Doctor who only looked politely puzzled. They crouched down, placing their weapons on the floor at their feet and lowered their heads in deep respectable bows. Jack and I stared at the monitor then at each other.

"Excuse me, I hope you don't mind my taking a rest stop here," the Doctor said timidly, at least it sounded timid in my voice.  
The guards raised their heads but it seemed like it was almost painful for them to look at him directly. "She speaks," one of them muttered. "The girl of True Color speaks to us," his tone sounded amazed and almost frightened.

We didn't wait any longer. Jack and I bolted to the door – I only stumbled once – and peeked out.  
"Sorry, er," the Doctor tried to keep going. He obviously didn't understand what 'true color' meant either. "I'm a bit of a dunce, but would you be so kind as to tell me what ship I'm on?"  
The guard that had spoken before looked at the Doctor as though he didn't believe he really existed. "Mistress of the True Color," he said like a prayer. "You are gracing the Venus under the command of Madam Klove."  
"And the Venus is originally from…?" the Doctor pressed him.  
The guard appeared to be near exploding or having some sort of hysterical fit if the Doctor addressed him again. "Gyniles," he answered humbly.

"What do they mean 'true color'?" I whispered to Jack.  
"I'm not sure," Jack muttered. "But I don't think they'd be too pleased if they found out that those aren't really his 'true colors' because you're wearing them – skin and all."

"You're joking!" the Doctor said to the guards.  
The guard shook his head. I began to think that his bursting into tears was eminent. "I would not do any such thing, my Mistress."  
The Doctor was smiling and signaled for us to come out. He held out his hand to steady me as I stood next to him, Jack on his other side. The guards took one look at us and got to their feet, their weapons trained on Jack and me.  
I let out a yelp and put my hands up. The one who spoke held what I assumed to be the front of a very large gun to my head – well, the Doctor's head.

"Oi! Hold on," the Doctor stepped in front of us, his arms spread protectively. "You will not touch them."  
The guard looked down at the Doctor but didn't budge, "They do not show the respect that is due you, Mistress." He pressed the barrel to my temple. I let out a small whimper.  
"Stay calm, Alice," the Doctor muttered.

I was about to snap back at him but the guard spoke first, "They must be eliminated. Only death to those who show no inferiority to a woman of True Color."  
"No, please," the Doctor said calmly, placing his hand on the weapon. "These are my companions. If you harm them I will leave," his voice grew in volume. "I will never be present among you or your people again and you will suffer my curse upon you."  
The guards were quite large as far as stature went but they looked terrified and released us.

"That's better, thank you," the Doctor said. "Now if you'll wait for just a tick," he grabbed me by the arm and motioned for Jack to join us.  
"Doctor, what is – "  
He held up his hand to silence me, "These people are the Gynil. Think of all the history of prejudice and racism on Earth and flip it around."

We thought for a moment and my eyes widened as the idea came to me. A ridiculous idea! "Men are thought the inferior gender."  
"Exactly," the Doctor said. "It's even more than that. In the Gynil culture gentlemen certainly do not prefer blondes. Dark hair, and a rosy complexion – skin with any kind of color actually is what they seek after."  
I glanced up out of our huddle and noticed the looks of the guards. They were all tall and incredibly handsome but extremely fair and blonde, almost as if they had no skin pigmentation at all.

"A woman who looks like you, Alice, would be considered near royalty,"  
I didn't like where this was going, "You mean a woman who looks like _you_!" I hissed. "What would they do, Doctor, if they found out that there was a man in that head instead of me?"  
The Doctor grimaced for just a second then smiled his adventurous and lunatic smile. It looked the same in any body he was in apparently. "Don't worry, Alice. This is the best disguise a man could ask for in this situation. Where's your sense of adventure?"  
"It seems you have it now," I moaned.

Jack laughed softly, "So what's the plan?"  
"You two will have to act like my escorts. Try and keep your opinions to yourselves. I'll find the original source for the signal we found and get us reversed before we do anything else."

The storage area or bay we were in shook, breaking my not falling over streak. The lights flickered and eventually came back on after a minute or so.  
"What's happening?" the Doctor asked the guards as Jack helped me back to my feet.

"Do forgive us Mistress – "  
"Captain, why haven't you reported to your Commander yet?" his communicator went off somewhere on his person.  
"I have the intruders –" he said after pressing a button on his uniform.  
"Bring them to her as well," the voice was female and didn't sound like the most friendly person in the world…or universe.

The Doctor nudged me in the ribs as the guards approached us probably because I still looked terrified. Jack and I were completely ignored by them. "Commander Klove wishes to see you."  
"She isn't angry with us, is she?" I said before I could stop myself. The Doctor stood on my foot slowly applying more and more pressure until I spoke again, which probably wasn't what he'd been planning on.  
I cleared my throat and did some fast thinking, "I – I will have no harm come to my Mistress," I said, putting my hand protectively on the Doctor's shoulder.  
The lead guard seemed to form a different opinion of me and shook his head, finally addressing me, "She will be eager to meet your Mistress. That is all I can say."

"Very well," the Doctor said, trying to keep his face serious. "Take me to your leader."  
I rolled my eyes and Jack quickly began examining his feet. I think he'd started giggling.  
"Give me your arms," the Doctor hissed at Jack and me.

Jack immediately obeyed. The Doctor looped his now shorter and much more female arm through Jack's. When I understood I allowed him to do the same with me. So, Jack and I were going to be the Doctor's strong but silent escorts. I could handle that. Yes, I'd just let the Doctor do the talking, which was fine with me.  
I took a deep breath and moved in step with the Doctor and Jack. The former was looking all around as we entered a corridor, taking note of anything useful, I would've imagined. The colors of the ship all seemed to be coordinated in grays, silvers, and blues. Even the stiff uniforms of the guards were in blues and grays. The corridor was large in width and height as though we were in a sort of palace or expensive cruise liner rather than a space ship. It definitely seemed like it had been built for comfort more than anything else.  
Jack on the other hand seemed to be taking his role of escort very seriously – glaring at anyone who looked at us as we walked along the corridor and showing the proper respect to the women who passed by – those of the superior gender.

All of the women I saw who passed us had different shades of lovely blonde hair with the same lack of skin color as the guards. They were tall, slender, and strikingly beautiful like princesses in a fairy story. Every single one of them could have been a model on Earth. Even though I was in a man's body I grew to feel intimidated all the same. I would avoid their eyes and study the floor we were walking on. (Looked like expensive carpeting in a pale blue color.) They probably viewed it as proper respect due to them from a man, which was fine with me if they wanted to look at it that way.  
The Doctor jabbed Jack once or twice to keep him from winking at a few passers by. Even the women could look me or Jack in the eye without looking up. That's how tall and goddess like they all were. My average height body seemed downright petite in the present company.

We moved down the corridor. I tried to keep my eyes straight ahead to avoid the gaze of anyone but it wasn't difficult to notice a few of the woman checking me – I should say checking the Doctor out by blatantly scanning his body over from head to foot and then a second time if they so chose. I guess that was part of what the men had to put up with being the inferior gender – the blatant sizing up in public by any woman who chose to do so. Like construction workers whistling and cat calling as a woman passes by on the street.  
I was getting hot under my collar after seeing them smile beautifully at me. Nine hundred years old yes, but he still had hormones and was probably better at controlling them than I was. I began keeping my eyes to the floor whenever a woman on the ship approached us.

As for the Doctor in my body, no one looked directly at him. They would lower their eyes respectfully and move on – men and women alike. This 'true color' thing must have been deeply ingrained in their entire race and after seeing what they generally look like as a people, I could understand their view somewhat.

We stopped at the end of the corridor and got into a lift. After traveling upwards in the ship for a moment or so the lift doors opened to a brightly lit and very impressive looking control center. The walls were blue as were the uniforms of the people. Most of them were men, working along control panels and consoles the room was made up of. They all had some sort of devices wrapped around the back and crown of their heads that linked up to the front of their faces just below their lips and what looked like thin visors over their eyes. I didn't think they were there for the men's health.  
The women that were there wore a different type of uniform, they were full grey body suits with blue markings along the shoulders, sleeves, and collar. They were all beautiful of course, wearing their rippling blonde hair down over their shoulders. They didn't wear devices on their heads at all. When I noticed this, an instinctive dislike for the women grumbled in my chest.  
All were working on one thing or another, punching buttons on the control panels each of which held bright blinking lights and monitors of their own. It looked like a highly advanced call center.

Two of our security escort broke off from our group and moved to other parts of the room. The head guard continued to lead us through the control center – many of the workers doing double takes when they saw us, the Doctor especially. Honestly, the one time I was popular and I couldn't even be in my body to enjoy it!  
We reached an oval shaped door and the guard allowed us to step through and he brought up the rear.

The room was large and lovely, filled with rich fabrics and expensive looking furniture, all of which was blue, white, and gray along with the rest of the ship.  
But I didn't look at the furnishings for very long. We stood in front of a large desk. Two tall men stood at attention on either side of the desk. Behind the desk at the very center a woman stood to greet us. I had to keep my mouth from falling open. I believed she was an actual goddess. Her skin was lily white and perfectly flawless. Her hair was so blonde it was nearly white as well and ran in thick soft waves down to the middle of her back. She wore robes of silver and white and on her head she wore a thin silver circlet that just draped over her forehead.

I'd never before met royalty in person but I believed I stood staring at one of the fairest queens who ever could exist. That's what it was, exactly! As she got to her feet to greet us, I was reminded of the story _The Snow Queen_ for she looked as beautiful but at the time, I couldn't tell if her kiss was of ice.

The Doctor and Jack managed to keep their facial expressions neutral. The Doctor especially didn't seem remotely impressed with her at all. He bowed his head respectfully and Jack and I followed suit.  
"Commander Klove," the Doctor greeted her.

"Three," Commander Klove said in a velvety voice that perfectly matched her appearance. "Three of True Color." She moved around the desk and stood before us. "Two men, but still – "she looked closely at Jack, her fact barely an inch from his.  
She then sidestepped and stood in front of me. I could feel the Doctor's and Jack's nervous glances but I breathed steadily and kept my focus straight ahead. "Such _dark_ eyes, the color of a dying sun," she said to me as she raised her hand and brushed at the hair above my ear. I met her eyes and tried not to blink. Even the eyes seemed colorless. They were bright but the iris' were barely distinguishable from the whites aside from a thin darker circle that differentiated the two in a line, bordering the iris'.

At last, she bent down and looked at the Doctor, "Hair, nearly black as space itself but eyes that hold oceans in them." She then stood to her full height and surveyed the three of us. "I have never seen the like. Three beings of True Color who managed to board my ship without any difficulty."  
"Well, if you know what you're doing," the Doctor said with a smile.

Her pale eyes snapped to him, "Tell me your name, young woman."  
"I'm -"  
- Jack cleared his throat loudly which made the Doctor pause for a moment.  
"Alice, my name is Alice and these are my companions, Jack and the – " he looked up at me as though I had any wise ideas about what to call myself while I was in his body, "The Doctor."

Klove moved back to me and smiled a honey sweet smile. I felt the urge to fake vomit all over her silver robes but thought the better of it and continued staring straight ahead. "The curious dark eyes and also a man of science – well, as far as men can take the sciences of course."  
I wanted to punch her.  
"Actually," the Doctor interjected, most likely sensing my thoughts. "I've taught both of them myself. They're quite bright for being you know, male."

The ship shook us again and it sounded like the power was failing or draining. Klove rocked towards me and it seemed as though the Doctor's reflexes worked of their own accord. I caught her and steadied her back on her feet, "Are you alright?" I spoke automatically.  
Her hands slipped slowly off of my arms and she smiled once again, "Yes, thank you." She pushed her hair away from her face – a move that any adult woman could recognize from a mile away.  
Instead of punching her, I now wanted to run away.

"Mistress Alice, perhaps you and your Doctor can help us repair a small problem with the power supply. That is why we are out in such deep space. To be more to the point, our planet is dying." Commander Klove stepped away from me and turned quite serious, "I was sent with the mission to find fuel for our power source or locate a new one."  
"And so far?" the Doctor asked.  
"Nothing," Klove confessed though her voice sounded crestfallen, her position and stance, everything about the way she held herself reeked of confidence. I found myself envying her…for a very short time.

"You don't have a backup plan in case you don't find anything?" I blurted.  
Her eyes snapped to mine and I lowered my head, "I'm sorry, Mistress." I mumbled.  
"No, Doctor. The Venus is the last hope for our world. We do not have the power to evacuate everyone and there is no useable light on the surface."

"Well, enough chatting," the Doctor said, rubbing his small hands together. "Let's have a look at that power source."  
"Very well," Klove slipped her arm through the crook in my own before I knew what was going on.  
My brain stopped and I turned towards the Doctor and Jack out of panic.

"The source is located in the engineering chambers," Klove said, pulling on my arm. "Now, Doctor, there's no need to be shy. I am offering you the opportunity to be my escort. You should have all the envy of he men on this vessel. Be honored, Doctor." She spoke with a smile but for some reason I could sense a threat in there somewhere.  
"Oh, I am, Mistress – very much so. Only I do not feel worthy to be at your side. Surely one of the others – "  
"Modest as well," she met my nervous gaze and smiled beautifully again.

I looked over my shoulder again at the Doctor who had Jack by the arm and mouthed a panicked _Help me!_ before Klove dragged me out of the room. Her guards followed.


	4. Chapter 4 Power Leeches

Chapter 4 – Power Leeches

Oh, I was going to kill them both! All they could do was smirk stupidly when I asked them to help me escape from a woman who seemed to be an expert at blatant flirting. Jack would've been much better company for her. After the Doctor and I got our own bodies back I was going to kick them both in the groin!

I could hear the Doctor and Jack muttering back and forth as we walked. Klove placed her hand over mine, "I have been in command of this vessel for four years and before that my mother was the commander. She died when the first of the power reserves were lost. The Venus fell into an ion storm with minimal shields."  
"I'm sorry," I said softly. "I lost my mother some years ago as well."  
"Then you know what it is to have command of your life so early on. Only I have command of a ship."

In and out of another lift. Klove brought us into a large room with panels along the walls that opened up into a circular chamber at one end. The ceiling was high and even higher in the chamber. Two large transparent tubes were first noticed in the chamber, one coming down from the ceiling, the other reaching up from the floor. They met in the center where a self contained silver sphere about the size of a yoga ball hovered in between them. Sparks and shocks of light flashed from it at random intervals.

"It is unstable," Klove said as we approached it. 'Our scientists cannot find the cause."  
The Doctor slipped on his useless spectacles and approached it, his hands in his pockets. "Looks like your containment field is failing," he said and he motioned for Jack and I to come look at it as well.  
Klove finally let me go and I had to keep myself from running over to the Doctor. I got a closer look of the sphere and the tubes. The sphere hovered gently between the two but it continued sparking and flashing lights and charges in the chamber.

"It's your basic Shell – a sphere that can contain and/or convert any type of power source you want save for a few exceptions, of course. But it's cracking," he took of the glasses and turned to the Commander. "What's the source you've got inside it?"  
The three of us looked at Klove who seemed to lose her confident exterior for a moment before she answered, "Centuries ago a meteor crashed onto our planet causing several cave ins. Our engineers examined the pieces and found sources of alien technology in them. I am not a scientist so I cannot give you a full detail but we found the energy stored in that lump of rock to be much more efficient than our original source. We adapted it and it is now failing us."

"You don't even know what's powering your ship," it wasn't a question. The Doctor stared at Klove. "And you don't care, do you? Where have you been searching for power?" I didn't like the tone the Doctor put to my voice at all.  
Klove clenched her jaw but didn't answer.  
"I see," the Doctor said seriously. "You've been using what you've got left to leech power from anywhere you could find it…through subspace." His voice turned more dangerous and I backed away slightly, standing next to Jack.

"Subspace?" I blurted.  
"Think of all the universe inside a big ball and the outer layering of the ball is subspace – outside dimensions and around the Void. They're using the universe for power any way they can get it." The Doctor glared at Klove who narrowed her eyes.  
"I'm sorry," Jack said as he looked at the energy sphere. "With respect and all that, Mistress. Is she saying that right now you don't know what's in there?" he pointed at the sphere above his head.

I was racking my brain, trying to keep up with what they were saying. "The signal we found!" I said triumphantly.  
The Doctor nodded, "Like a needle and thread. They can poke that beam out of the fabric of time and space and then back through to wherever they want without moving the ship at all, get what they want and pull it back through again. _That's_ what's draining the power. And that's what – " the Doctor and I exchanged significant glances and we understood each other.

Klove's beautiful face was contorted into an angry scowl. She still could've been a model. "We harm no one. All we want is to keep our world alive."

"How can you know that? You don't know what energy it's taking. You could be doing serious damage to other worlds, other species!" The Doctor pursed his lips. "That's something I can't allow."  
Klove walked gracefully to the Doctor who stood his ground, locking his jaw and stared unblinkingly up at the Commander who in my opinion looked much more threatening. "Are you accusing me of something, Miss Alice? I warn you, questioning the Command of the Venus comes with a very high price," her voice was soft and deadly.  
The Doctor frowned angrily, "You're not worthy to command if you continue to allow this."

I cringed as Klove considered the Doctor for a moment before she lifted a slender hand and slapped it with an echoing crack across my face – mine as in the Doctor's face. I staggered in shock, my eyes watering with pain. My knees hit the floor and I heard Jack and the Doctor's protests. Jack was at my side, trying to pry my hand from my face. My head ached. She hit me so hard I was seeing double.

I looked to my right and saw my face coming into focus.  
"What'd you go after him for?" the Doctor shouted.

"I don't know where you come from but I still know my place. A woman of True Color cannot by touched by a woman of my rank. It would be disrespectful," Klove explained.  
"Oh, I'll touch her," I muttered. "I'll touch her so hard that – "  
Jack shushed me as Klove snapped her fingers. The three imposing white-blonde haired men stepped forward and wrenched us off the floor. The one who held the Doctor wore black gloves up to his elbows.

"Put them in a holding cell. We cannot have their interference," the Commander ordered and swept out of the room.  
My fair haired guard held both my arms behind my back and marched me through a door and down a corridor. I could hear Jack grunting uncomfortably behind me. With unnecessary and downright rude roughness our guards tossed Jack and I into our cell while the third walked the Doctor in my body into the cell, released him and bowed to him before stepping out and sealing us in.

The cell was a dark dirty grey. The artificial lights flickered on and the only things in the room besides the three of us were a small cot and a spindly chair. The only window was a small piece of glass that showed the stars outside. I wandered over to the cot and sat down in a depressed and achy huff while Jack felt along the walls, looking for a weakness of some kind. I glanced up and saw the Doctor standing in a corner, his back to us performing a weird sort of tribal dance.

"What _are_ you doing?" I said sharply.  
"Almost got it – " he said as he leaped around, his hands mangling the front of his shirt.  
"Doctor!" I exclaimed.  
"Calm down, Alice," – I was growing tired of him saying that to me – "I'm over nine hundred year old. You haven't got anything I haven't seen a hundred times before."  
"I don't care! You don't have to see mine!"

"I've got it," the Doctor said and pulled his hand from the shirt, the sonic screwdriver in his hand.  
Jack chuckled, "What else have you got in there?"  
"Oi!" I yelled, my cheeks growing hot.

"Leave her alone, Jack. But seriously," the Doctor fiddled with the screwdriver. "That guard could barely keep a hold on me, much less frisk me for hidden devices."  
Jack and I both winced.

"You…you had it in my bra?" I gaped at him like a cod fish.  
"Well, _my_ bra at the moment," he said in a matter of fact tone as he went to the closed cell door.

I sighed and rubbed my hands over my face. This was getting really old, the big hands and the sideburns.  
The Doctor ran the screwdriver up and down the seam but turned it off looking slightly disappointed. "Deadlock seal," he mumbled.  
"I've told you before how unreliable that thing is," Jack said with a smile.

The Doctor ignored Jack's comment with a shrug and sat down on the cot next to me, "So, team, what do we know?"  
I rubbed the side of my face where Klove had hit me, "I know that I'm going to rip that woman's hair out by the pretty roots and then – "  
"Come on, Alice," the Doctor said. "Use that imagination of yours."

"Or maybe I could push her out of an airlock, pull her back in, then push her out again. I could do it until I got bored."  
"That's imaginative," Jack said with a raise of his eyebrows.  
"Alice," the Doctor said warningly.

I sighed as Jack straddled the chair, sitting in front of us, "These people search for sources of power everywhere, right?"  
"They could be using anything," Jack said. "That sphere converts most anything into the type of power they need."  
"That's what we saw, isn't it Doctor? That's what happened to us," I said, looking at him.

His head was lowered, staring at the floor in thought, but he nodded the affirmative. "They would have taken our very life energy if I hadn't reversed it. On a human's life they could keep power for…about a week or so, but with mine or even yours Jack – "  
"Or the TARDIS," Jack added.  
"They'd never get in," the Doctor said confidently. "Still, we have to keep in disguise."

I moaned as Jack patted me on the knee consolingly. We sat in silence, the Doctor and Jack thinking up a plan and me sitting there wanting to be back in my own body and maybe have a good nap in my own bed. The Doctor's body didn't seem to be tired physically but my mind was tired – almost like it was when I had first met the Doctor because of the Culraith – an energy based alien that had –  
My brain woke up, "It can draw anything from the universe, that beam, right?" I said as the idea unfolded in my tired brain.  
"If the power signature is strong enough." The Doctor replied. "That's probably why it came to Earth in the first place, I was there."

I tried to work out what I wanted to say but it was difficult to organize my thoughts. I was completely out of my own very small and insignificant element. "Suppose – well if you think about – " I stammered, frustrated that I could express what I was thinking properly.  
But the Doctor and Jack didn't appear frustrated. On the contrary, they looked intrigued.  
"Take your time Alice, what are you thinking?"

They were leaning towards me, expectant expressions on their faces.  
"I'm really outside of my own little world here but do you remember, Doctor, when you were telling me about energy life forms? The universe is full of them, right?"  
"Of course," the Doctor muttered, his eyes staring.

I turned to Jack who still looked mildly confused, "What if there's a Culraith in there or something like that?"  
"No, no, no," the Doctor said, getting to his feet running his hands through what was his hair at the time. I'd have to deal with it when we got switched back, I thought bitterly for a moment.  
"A Culraith?" Jack said. "Those are only stories Alice," he said reassuringly.

"So was the Time War to you, Jack, remember?" the Doctor said, turning to Jack with a look in his eyes that I had never seen before. Even though they were my eyes, they held the depth that the Doctor seemed to always carry with him. I supposed it travels with him no matter where he ends up.  
"The Doctor and I met because a Culraith was feeding off of my emotions," I said to Jack. His eyes widened with substantial shock but I knew he believed me.

The ship shuddered and the power died. The room went dark save for the stars outside the small window.  
"Doctor?" I said and got to my feet. There was a pressure on my shoulder.  
"Take it easy, Alice," Jack said in my ear.

I took his hand in mine as another shudder shook us inside the cell and the lights flickered back on. Jack released my hand. The Doctor was at the door, sonic screwdriver in hand. He turned to Jack and I and pressed a finger to his lips to silence us. He clicked the screwdriver off and approached us. We bent down to listen.

"It's not a Culraith," the Doctor said in hushed tones. "Even if a Culraith allowed itself to be caught this ship would have been ripped apart by now. Culraiths are too aggressive. But I think Alice is right. There's something trapped in there, but first thing's first." He looked at me through my own eyes, "I don't want to risk Alice's body, I have no right to. First, we fix us then we fix everything else, agreed?"  
Jack and I nodded.  
"But what about the deadlock seal?" Jack said. "We still can't get out."  
A sly and intelligent grin spread across the Doctor's face, "That power drain released the seal on the door and I kept it from reactivating when the power came back."

Jack laughed, "Brilliant."  
"I know!" the Doctor said as I smiled and rolled my eyes.  
"But there has got to be at least two guards outside," I whispered.  
"Three," Jack corrected.

"Come on, Alice. You're in a pretty agile body, aren't you? You should try it out and see what it can do." The Doctor winked at me and moved to the door as I tried to think of a logical argument.


	5. Chapter 5 Home and Memory

Chapter 5 – Home and Memory

I followed reluctantly as the Doctor opened the heavy door a crack and pocked the sonic screwdriver out. The silence outside was broken shortly afterwards by a snapping and surging noise and a few shouts from the guards.  
"No communications to the upstairs," the Doctor muttered and stowed the screwdriver back in his shirt. Jack stood at the side of the door and lifted his hand and three fingers to us. He began the countdown, three…two…one.

We ripped the door open and charged out, Jack taking on two guards at once, the Doctor ran to the control panel along the back wall. I leaped out and ran, arms flailing towards the third guard who had his weapon raised but was only staring at me as though he didn't really know what to make of the crazy, skinny guy running at him like an institutionalized lunatic.  
I bellowed and without any thought in my petrified brain I kneed the man in the crotch and pounded him on the back with both fists as he doubled over. He collapsed to the floor with a groan. I stepped over him, blood pumping in my ears and found Jack, who looked mildly impressed though both o f his opponents were knocked out cold and mine was only groaning and wallowing around on the floor.

"Here," he said, handing me a weapon he'd taken off one of the guards.  
It weighed heavy in my hands but I didn't have trouble with it. Jack kicked the guard I'd dealt with and took his weapon as well.

"Alright, we're still not detected but it won't take them long to realize that the communications are down in this room," the Doctor said as the outer door opened.  
We braced ourselves for more guards.

"Captain, I wish to speak further to the – " Klove walked in and stopped dead, her lovely mouth open slightly in shock.  
Jack grabbed her by the arm and pulled her inside, tossing her to me. I took hold of her, feeling a little more confident in the matter, twisted her arm behind her back and clamped my hand over her mouth.

The Doctor stood in front of us and pointed his sonic screwdriver at her. "Take us back to your engineering chamber," he said.  
I lifted my hand from her mouth. "Clever Alice. Would you really kill me if I refused?"  
"Of course not," he said in absolute detest of the idea. "You'll just end up killing yourself anyway unless you let us help you. We have an idea that could save your ship."

"I don't believe you," she snapped.  
"Listen to her," I said. "Keep in mind that I'm not afraid to touch you, Mistress."  
She laughed, "I wouldn't fight against your touch, Doctor." She pressed her back against me. For the second time that day, I wanted to vomit on her.  
"Don't you even start, lady. You've got absolutely no idea who you're dealing with." I twisted her arm tighter and she stopped moving.

"Either you let us help or you sentence your people to death. Your choice," the Doctor said, flipping the screwdriver in the air and catching it again.  
Klove clenched her jaw, her eyes moving from the Doctor to Jack, who had his weapon trained on her forehead. She nodded and I let her go. Jack took her firmly by the arm and walked with her out into the corridor.

I walked with the Doctor, holding the weapon at my side.  
"You know, I think she fancies you a bit," he muttered with a small grin.  
"Oh no you don't! She fancies _you_. This is you in this suit, not me." I mumbled back to him.  
"You really like the suit?"  
"It's a good color on you…and it's quite comfortable actually. But I do like the one you wore when we met as well."  
"That one never gets old," he said with a smile.

We entered the engineering chambers and Klove immediately ordered the staff out of the room, claiming that she had something private to discuss with the three of us though we all knew the real reason why she told her crew to leave. She wanted no one to realize of her failure as Commander of the Venus.  
As she spoke I realized that it hadn't occurred to me earlier – the pressure she was under to save her own planet. But I couldn't help the thought that entered my mind right then, something the Doctor and I had discussed shortly after we'd met. Everything dies.

Jack and the Doctor moved swiftly over the controls, asking Klove questions as they worked.  
Klove sat against the wall as I kept watch on her while the two boys were occupied. "Why are you activating the Energy Snare? It's the sphere that is dying," she said.  
"All in good time, Commander," the Doctor replied. "There's something that needs fixing first."

Jack came back around the main power chamber that held the sphere. "That should do it. Reversing the polarity is no good. You'll have to do the same trick you did last time, Doctor."  
"And just hope," the Doctor said, scratching his head.  
"Yeah,"  
"Well, it's a good thing that I'm full of that," he looked at me and held out his hand as Jack came up beside me to keep an eye on Klove.

The Doctor took my hand and stood next to me. "Alright, it should be the same as before only this time, you should be you again."  
"Okay," I held on tight to his hand and closed my eyes as he activated the snare.

The music started and just as before, it grew louder, more piercing. The blue light flashed as I heard a wordless bellow in my own voice. Again, I fell to my knees and covered my ears as the noise became unbearably screeching.  
As soon as it had started, it stopped, allowing silence to take us over again.

I was laying down when I heard my name. Someone was calling me. The voice was so familiar. I blinked and blinked again. I was still in the engineering room, staring up at the high ceiling when I saw his face come into view and hover over me.  
"Alice," he said without attempting to contain his smile. The Doctor in full body and mind was smiling down at me.  
"It worked?" I said in my own voice. Oh, I'd missed it! I lifted my hands to my face and saw that they were my hands – small and delicate without any of the dark hairs. The echo of the double heart beat was gone.

I smiled back and sat up. The Doctor grabbed a hold of my hands and pulled me up.  
"Looks like it did. I'm brilliant," he said happily.  
"I'll give you that, for now," I said.  
He laughed and put his arms around me, lifting me off my feet in a warm hug. I was so much more comfortable looking up at him than looking down and I held him tightly in return.

A sort of energy discharge went off close by and the Doctor immediately released me and set me back down.  
"Jack!" I exclaimed.  
The Doctor held me by my arm – his grip much stronger now – keeping me at his side. Jack lay dead, sprawled on the polished hard floor at Commander Klove's feet. She held one of the weapons we'd taken from her guards and pointed it at the Doctor and me.

Her eyes looked wilder in her beautiful face. "I am not a violent person, I assure you," she said calmly which made her appear even more insane with that half smiling expression on her face.  
"But you killed him!" I yelled angrily.  
"I cannot stand aside and allow you to destroy all that we've worked for,"

"It's still killing you," the Doctor said, his grip still holding me in place.  
"Not for long, Doctor," she said, her eyes flashing. "Do you think that no one heard your little conversation in the cell?" her smile widened and scared the hell out of me. "Whatever you are, Doctor, I imagine that you should fuel my world for a long while."  
"You'd commit murder – "  
"For an entire planet? Yes! For years I have waited and now I have found a power source beyond any I could hope to find." she stayed about a meter in front of us.

The sphere crackled and spat sparks, creating flashes of light that made it look like we were in the middle of a lightning storm.  
Klove's eyes were mad and her face twitched with her smile. In the flashing light she looked like mad and pale spirit that had come back from the dead.

There was movement just inside my line of vision. I rotated my head a fraction. Jack's hand was moving.  
"Very clever, by the way - switching your intelligences like that so your little girl would be the one with the brains." She looked at me with distain.  
I narrowed my eyes, "Hold on just a minute you high and mighty bi –"  
"I don't believe you're capable of that, Commander – "

- Jack's eyes opened and he took a deep breath of air. Klove hadn't noticed. The Doctor had however. He was pressing his foot down on mine.  
"Your people look up to you like they would a queen. She wouldn't become a murderer when there was another solution staring her in the face. Let me help you."  
Jack sat up and looked over at us. He smiled broadly and picked up the weapon he'd dropped when Klove had shot him. She'd _shot_ the man and he was sitting there, looking at me! I thought he was human…wasn't he?

"Oh, and allow you to find fault with more things I'm responsible for?" She jabbed the weapon into the Doctor's chest as Jack tiptoed up behind her and pressed the barrel of his gun in the small of her back.  
"Rule number one: Never turn your back on an enemy," he said in her ear.  
The Doctor wrenched the weapon out of her hands and gave it to me. It was ridiculously heavy. Jack nudged Klove against the wall and sat her down. He turned back to us. The burn mark on his shirt where he was hit with the blast of Klove's gun was clear as day.

He looked between the Doctor and me until his eyes finally rested on me. He pointed his finger at me, "Alice?"  
"Yep," I grinned. My stomach completely left me when he smiled. I guess the reaction to his smile with me in my body was much more potent than when I was in the Doctor's body.  
"Fantastic," he said and nearly knocked me over with a hug of his own. "You're much cuter as you," he said after he let me go.  
"Thanks,"

"Stop it," the Doctor said in his wonderfully familiar tone of voice. It always sounded weird when I spoke through it. He stood over a panel of controls and put his hand in his inside jacket pocket but pulled it out again, empty and started patting his hip and chest pockets.  
Something clicked in my hand. I looked down and saw that I'd been holding the sonic screwdriver the entire time. The Doctor was crawling along the floor in search for it when I tapped him on the back and held it out to him.

He smiled happily, "Ah, thanks. You've got my specs too?"  
I dug in my jeans pocket and pulled out the pair of useless glasses, "But you really don't - "  
The Doctor placed two fingers over my lips and gave me a stern look. I glanced at Jack who was working along the opposite wall. I smiled and nodded as he took his fingers away.

"There's no reading on the inside of the sphere. We can't see what it's holding," Jack said. "The scanners can't penetrate it while it's functioning."  
The Doctor ran to Jack's side and I followed though I knew I was of little help, "We'll have to get the auxiliary power cells online and shut the sphere down."

I stood next to Jack. My eyes continued to move from his hands on the control panel to the black scorch mark on his chest that was about the size of my open hand. He should be dead but it might as well have never happened judging by the way he was acting. He didn't even have a bloody nose or anything to show for it besides a ruined shirt.  
"Are – are you alright, Jack?" I asked tentatively.

He stopped working and looked at me with a small smile, "Oh yeah. Energy weapons are much better than projectiles because then I'm not left with a bunch of holes and bullets lodged in my body afterwards, which is always a laugh, I can tell you."  
I blinked, my lips parted slightly as the Doctor chuckled while he worked. I glanced between the two of them with the sneaking feeling that I was missing out on a joke. "You've been shot at a lot then?"

Jack didn't answer right away. He looked up at the Doctor first who gave a short nod and continued his work.  
"A while back after I'd first met the Doctor – "  
"Oh that was fun, wasn't it? The nanogenes," the Doctor said with a nostalgic smile.  
"We were in the middle of a battle and I was killed – just a split second and I was stone dead," he paused and took a breath, pressing his lips together. "And then, right after…I was alive again."

I goggled at him, "But how? Who?"  
"Rose," the Doctor said softly. "Rose used the power of the TARDIS, brought him back, and won the battle. She saved us all that day." He spoke quietly as though he were praying when speaking of her. "That girl that you keep seeing in my memories – that's her." he said, his eyes burning into me.

A new image came into my head. It was the girl with long blonde hair and a pretty smile but she wasn't smiling. She was crying with a shining light behind and all around her. The memory died and I was looking at the Doctor again. I had already been in his body, witnessed his home world burning, but with the images of this woman continuously cropping up in my mind and when the Doctor spoke of her – I believe I grew to know him even better in that moment.  
There was a pain in every memory of her, no matter what it was. I thought to ask him about it but I couldn't be sure how he would react. I decided I would first think on it more – see if I could figure it out first.

"Oh," I exhaled slowly and kept my eyes on the Doctor who continued to look at me for another few seconds before returning to his work. It was Jack's turn to look confused but he didn't get a chance to ask.


	6. Chapter 6 The Musel

Chapter 6 – The Musel

An alarm went off in the ship and the lights dimmed. A patter of footsteps was coming closer to us until a dozen or more armed guards ran into the room as Klove stood up to her full height. Every weapon in the room now pointed at us – more specifically, the Doctor and Jack.  
The Doctor moved behind me and muttered in my ear, "The blue button – zero point six one microns," he said and stepped away.  
What the _hell_ was that supposed to mean? I had no idea what he was talking about and stood there staring at Klove and the guards who appeared as though they didn't want to look at me if they could help it.

"Commander, you surprise me," the Doctor said looking completely relaxed even though half an arsenal was pointed at his head and chest. All eyes immediately snapped to him, "Would you kill a woman – a woman of True Color no less?"  
Of course! It finally entered my brain. They were afraid of me still.

"Escort the girl to the holding cell. You may kill the others," Klove commanded.  
The weapons were raised pointing at the Doctor and Jack.  
The Doctor cleared his throat loudly and I thought I heard a soft squeaky voice say, "Any time now, Alice…" and his idea clicked in my brain.

I stepped forward nervously, "Stop," I said. "You will not fire on these men," the Doctor and Jack were just behind me and I spread my arms protectively in front of them.  
The guards hesitated, some staring at me, others looking at Klove for further orders. My entire body shook but I stood firmly on my feet and raised my hand pointing a finger at them. "You will drop your weapons," I said as though I were casting a powerful spell.

There was a clanking and clattering as the guns were dropped to the floor and the men stood, their hands folded in front of them and their heads bowed respectfully to me.  
"Good," I said, smiling nervously. "Keep Commander Klove where she is and no harm will come to anyone. I don't want to hurt anyone," I said, getting more and more into the character.

I moved around the central control panel and found a keypad next to a square blue button. I entered 0.61 into the keypad and pressed the blue button. The remainder of the lights died save for the silvery blue light that was emanating from the sphere above our heads.  
Everyone was looking at it now including Jack and the Doctor. I stood next to them and stared at it as well.

"I thought it was powered down," I muttered.  
"It has. That's the light of whatever is inside it," the Doctor said. "It's breaking free."

A crashing sound echoed through the engineering chambers and the surface of the sphere splintered and cracked until it was filled with a web of fine jagged lines on its once smooth surface. The light around it built up until the sphere shattered into small glittering pieces. The Doctor pushed the back of my head forward to hide my face and huddled next to me as the shards of the sphere fell all around us to the floor.

I glanced up after the sphere was in pieces. The silver light was still intact though the light itself had dulled and fell to the floor as well, in a beautiful sparkling heap of light and dark all moving together in a powerful light show.  
The mass of light flowed in a cloud of mist around us until it hovered in front of Klove. Her eyes were wide with fear and her mouth was open but she couldn't speak. She screamed as the light enveloped her. It surrounded her in a shell of energy and then released her, leaving her unharmed.

The light then flew from her and once again collected itself in a mass of energy on the floor in front of The Doctor, Jack, and me. It stretched and grew as though it were developing in slow motion until I could see the form of a person being made directly in front of me. Then it grew more details and I saw that it was a woman and then, a semi transparent, glittering replica of Commander Klove stood in front of us with eyes like the very stars themselves.

"I am free," it was Klove's voice, or at least a strange version of it. It seemed to echo through the ship and then come back to us with every word.  
"You are free," the Doctor said with a grin, the light of the cloud reflecting in his amazed eyes. "Please forgive these people for your imprisonment. They were unaware."

The glowing Klove closed her eyes, "The sound! Please speak more to me."  
"I beg your pardon," the Doctor tilted his head, his face in a curious frown.  
She smiled, "So long without any tones. No music for me – starving."

"Who are you?" I asked timidly.  
The starlit eyes looked down at me and pierced right into my heart. I took a step back and ran into one of the boys. The Doctor's hand rested comfortingly on my shoulder.  
"I am the Musel of the planet Core."

"Oh, of course, the universes Muses," the Doctor said excitedly. "Music lovers of the Galaxies – literally. Alice, the Musel live off of the energy of sound waves. That's why she wants us to speak only – " he surveyed the Musel. "This one is nearly gone. Speech isn't enough."  
"I am dying, sir. So long trapped in the dark. All of the senses of space blocked from me," she spoke sadly and wavered. The light she created flickered and the silvery-blue energy swirled about her like colored gasses mixing together.

I wished I'd brought my MP3 player. That would've been enough music to charge her up again, as it were.  
"I can help you," the Doctor said and then turned to Jack. "We'd have to route a signal through the ship's communications system."  
"What sort of signal? People talking to her won't be enough," Jack said.  
The Doctor ran his hands back and forth through his hair as he thought quickly. "Voices," he muttered. "Vocals, vocal chords, pure sound waves, not mechanical ones – natural sound – " he paced around and around us.

The Musel continued to look at me with ice colored eyes that glittered with her entire form like a crystal in the sunlight. I'd never seen anything so beautiful. Klove was beautiful herself but the Musel in her form made her beauty pure and more lovely than any other physical form in creation.  
The figure of Klove began to fade, the energy particles dispersing. She was dying.

"Doctor," I said, reaching out a hand to her but there was nothing to hold onto. The particles danced and played around my hand like falling snowflakes that illuminated my skin.  
The Doctor turned and pointed at me, his eyes popping out of his skull and his brows nearly disappearing into his hair line. "Alice!" he said making me jump. "Sing! Sing something, anything!  
"I don't sing," I said automatically.  
"Now is hardly the time to be modest. You sang at your mother's funeral, remember?" he tapped his forehead with two fingers, his eyes bugging out at me.  
"I did – " I glared at him then glanced at the Musel. Her light was nearly gone. "But – but what should I sing?"

"Anything! Preferably not "I've Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts". It needs to have more drawn out tones – more melody." He had his sonic screwdriver out and was scanning it over the Musel.  
My mind was racing but it continually was going back to my mother. I wiped the moisture from my eyes and closed them, picking my starting note out of the air and began to sing my Mother's favorite song, _Somewhere Over the Rainbow_.  
I sang it simply but clearly, holding the notes as long as my breath would hold out. The Musel started to take shape again and the particles brightened with strength. She was smiling and stepped towards me.  
"Don't stop Alice," Jack said behind me.

The face was right in front of me and she moved closer. I kept my voice going as the silver light encompassed me and I was looking through a rippling world of light to the world of matter that existed outside. It grew brighter and brighter until there was a glowing white light surrounding every part of me.  
There was a voice. A soft sweet voice that wasn't human at all but it spoke to me just the same and I understood, "Thank you."

The light became so bright that I shielded my eyes as I ended the song.  
_Why, oh why can't I?  
_I stopped, still covering my eyes.

"Alice. Alice are you okay?"  
Hands gripped my wrists and pulled my fingers from my eyes. The Doctor's face was in front of mine looking mildly worried. The Musel had gone. The auxiliary lights had come back on in the room.

"Did it work? Is she okay?" I said, looking back into the Doctor's eyes.  
"Oh yes," he said. "The Musel left the ship on your own power. Well done Alice Crown," he smiled and held me to him once again.  
"Thanks," I said, trying not to blush.  
"No, seriously, you have a lovely voice," he said as he let me go.

"Where did she go?"  
The Doctor shrugged, "Home probably or anywhere else really. The universe is just a huge playground for energy life forms. Well," he smiled his boyish smile. "And me of course."

I laughed and felt a touch on my shoulder. Jack smiled at me, his bright blue eyes moist with tears.  
"Jack," I said sounding surprised. "Are you alright?" I put my hand on his arm.  
He sniffed and wiped his eyes, "That was just Fan-Tastic, Alice. Really, just brilliant."

I couldn't help but feel a sense of alarm - brave man like Jack breaking down right in front of me. I turned to the Doctor who shrugged and pursed his lips – a sure sign of trying not to laugh.  
"Thank you," I said to Jack who nodded and took my roughly in a one armed hug, giving me a kiss on the forehead.  
I patted his back awkwardly.

"Alright, now that that's over with," the Doctor said, prying me out of Jack's headlock.  
Jack hoisted his gun up and threw his shoulders back. "What about this lot?" he said.

The guards and Klove were all staring wide eyed and muttering to themselves.  
"Looks like you'd better make a speech or something," the Doctor whispered to me.  
"Why?" I said, backing away and running into Jack.

"What they've just seen is something comparable to the power of a god to them. You communicated with their very source of power and brought it to life."  
"You talked to it too," I protested.  
"But you are the Woman of True Color, Alice. Like it or not, you're royalty to them. I could talk to them forever and they'd hardly listen to a word because of what I look like at the moment."  
"At the moment…?" I asked but Jack nudged me forward.

I stumbled but stayed on my feet. A collective gasp through the group and the crowd of people fell silent in front of me.  
"Er…"  
A cry came from the center of the group, "She means to execute us for keeping her captive!" A young man ran to the front of the panicking group and fell on his face in front of me, "Oh please Mistress of Alice! Have mercy on us! We were disrespectful of your beauty and unaware of your great power. I swear to serve you until my death as comeuppance if you will spare us!"

I glanced back at the Doctor for any kind of advice but he only nodded his confidence in me and looked mildly amused. I could not leave these people thinking I was some sort of god unless they actually preferred worshiping clumsy, unintelligent mortals, and idea I doubted the truth of very much. "No, no, no, this is not happening." I said.

I squatted down in front of the young man. Well, he looked young but he was at least a foot taller than me and his shoulders twice as broad. "Look at me," I said gently.  
He hesitated but lifted his head and his eyes to mine.  
"What's your name?"  
The poor thing looked petrified but he answered me steadily, "Til."

"Hello Til, I'm Alice," I smiled and took his hand in mine. His fingers dwarfed mine and yet I knew that he was horrified that I willingly touched him.  
"Stand with me, Til." I said and lifted him up to his feet.  
He towered over me but still looked afraid. I held his hand as my eyes surveyed the rest of the group. Every man's mouth was hanging open, their eyes staring at us.

"I am not a god, a queen, a princess, a duchess, or anyone that deserves a title," I said the room at large. "I don't deserve to be worshipped. I'm human. I'm mortal just like you. See?" I held up my hand with the finger the Doctor had cut while he'd been borrowing my body. The cut wasn't bleeding but held a long red line on the skin. "I bleed just like you. I can get hurt just as you can."  
Till touched his finger to the cut on my hand. I smiled and kept his hand in mine.

"Where I come from men have just as much right as women to do as they please," I never thought I would be defending the gender of men anywhere. But here I was, proudly doing so for my father's and my brother's sake…not to mention the Doctor and Jack. "Both have their own special skills and qualities that work the best when men and women work together. You all need to work together to save your world."

I looked at them all – all men save for Klove – their beautiful eyes shining at me, their faces showing nothing but respect for me and what I was saying.  
"It is the same for my friends and I," I smiled back at Jack and the Doctor, the former saluted me, the latter nodded and winked. "We work together as man and woman…or whatever. My color is different from yours only because I come from a different world, not because I'm superior to you or anyone else."  
I looked up at Til, "And you know what else? Where I come from all of you would be considered so beautiful by anyone who saw you. When I saw you I thought you were the most lovely group of people I'd ever seen. I still do." Nothing more came to me. I stopped and let my eyes see them all as they saw me. The engineering room was silenced for a moment until there was some movement in the crowd.

"Alice!" the Doctor yelled just before a cry of unearthly rage erupted from the group. Klove, her mad eyes locked on me, was running at me at full speed with a fire that contorted her perfect face into what she really was.  
A strong arm pulled me away as two guards blocked Klove's path and held her struggling in their grasp.  
"You can harm no one else, Commander," Til held me behind him like an enormous and gorgeous guard dog.

"She destroyed the power source!" Klove screamed at the top of her lungs as they dragged her out. "She's murdered us all and you listen to her stupidity like mindless goats!"  
I placed my hand on Til's arm and he turned to me with colorless eyes save for the black pupil in the center. "Don't hurt her," I said.

"As you wish," he said as he took my hand and kissed it. "Queen, Princess, Goddess Alice – thank you for your words."  
"I hope they were understood," I said, glancing at the men who had stayed and were talking amongst themselves.  
"I believe so," Til said. "You may be another person amongst your people but you have made yourself a Queen to us."  
I smiled, "You weren't listening at all."

Another man, a little older than Til, approached us and smiled down at me, "Thank you Mistress Alice. You are very wise," he bowed his head to me and moved away. Behind him was a boy younger than Til, probably in his teens. He grinned and bowed to me, looking too shy to actually speak.  
More of the group approached me who wished to do so and I greeted them one by one, not allowing them to keep their eyes downcast when the approached.

"She is right though," I said to Til, after last man had left me. "How will you get home now? Your power is gone," I asked him.  
"I think I may be able to help with that," said a confident voice behind me. The Doctor grinned and nodded at Jack.


	7. Chapter 7 Traveling Companions

Chapter 7 – Traveling Companions

Help he did. The Venus was pulled back home under the power of the TARDIS. That was when I saw my very first alien planet. Gyniles. The planet rotated on its axis so slowly that the surface was uninhabitable. One side or the other was always unbelievably hot or severely cold. The people lived in an underground city they built of stone and water. The Doctor and Jack fixed it so their city could be powered off of the light and heat of the continuous sunlight on the surface. Solar power basically, the Doctor explained to me. The system stored energy as well therefore insuring the hope that they could continue to live on their home world for a long time.

We were back on the TARDIS after saying goodbye to Til and the rest of the Gynil who waved us off.  
"You know I think they were writing a song about you," Jack said to me as we walked up the ramp and the Doctor closed the doors behind us.  
"It was about us, Til told me," I corrected and took my seat by the TARDIS console.

Jack sat down next to me as the Doctor began switching and twisting knobs and levers around the console.  
"What were you guys talking about before we left?"  
The Doctor glanced up innocently, "Oh, we were discussing a little detour before dropping Jack off, weren't we?"  
"Yep," Jack said, nodding.  
"Oh, where are we going?" I said excitedly, sitting up in my seat.

Both men exchanged significant glances but said nothing further until the sound of the TARDIS died down. I ran down the ramp and got to the door first. My face fell as I opened it, the Doctor and Jack following me onto the pavement. We were on the north side of London. It was midday, the sky was actually clear for once and a lovely breeze was going through the air. I was back home. "Is this supposed to be a joke?" I asked the two of them.  
"Hold on, Alice. You'll see," the Doctor took my hand and Jack followed us down the street.

We walked a couple of blocks until the Doctor pulled me to the entrance of a restaurant and lounge that was basically open twenty four hours a day. My confusion deepened as we went in and were seated in a booth set along the side wall of the dimly lit and smoky restaurant.  
The Doctor was on one side of me and Jack was on the other and put his arm around my shoulders. I glanced at each of them in turn but they wouldn't look at me. Instead their eyes were on their menus. The Doctor rested his chin in his hand as he scanned over the food options.

"Are you going to tell me what – "  
"You're back so soon, brown eyes?" the voice struck a fuse inside my brain but I had no idea why. I couldn't place it anywhere.  
I glanced up into the horse-like face of a bleached blonde waitress who looked like she was attempting to hide the fact that she had put on weight. She nearly bulged out of her tight fitting white button down blouse and black trousers. She had makeup on but it didn't seem to help her much.

I stared at her then at her name tag which read 'Theresa' on it and nearly choked on my glass of water. I nudged the Doctor's leg with my foot underneath the table but he ignored me. I was going to kill him!  
"Hello, Theresa," the Doctor said with a kind smile. These are my very good friends I told you about. This is Jack," Jack smiled his lovely smile up at her, "And this is Alice. We've been traveling together a bit."

Theresa Blindt met my eyes and we knew each other. "Alice? Alice Crown?" she said with a gap toothed smile. Her eyes continued flitting to Jack and I had to do my best to keep from glaring at her.  
"Hi Theresa," I used all of my will power to smile at her, which seemed to work. "How've you been?"  
"Oh, I've been fantastic!" she flashed an engagement ring in front of me, the stone of which I could barely make out it was so small.  
"Congratulations," I said, keeping my smile plastered on my face as best I could.  
"Thanks," she said with a smile. "Greg's taken forever to set a date but it's finally happening this spring. He works construction – going to be manager soon." She said and she glanced down at my hands resting on the table.

"I see you're still not tired of the single scene," she said with a laugh that unsuccessfully veiled the scathing mocking in her voice.  
"Well," Jack piped up and scooted a little closer to me. I looked at him strangely but he kept his eyes and smile on Theresa. "That's not entirely true. Isn't that right sweetheart?" he turned to me with sparkling blue eyes and pecked me on the cheek.  
I stared at him.  
"Oh, she's still shy about telling anyone you see, because it hasn't been officially announced yet. We just got engaged," Jack continued. He placed his hand on my neck and cheek and smiled lovingly at me. "Her ring is custom and it's being finished on the southern side of town."

The Doctor kicked me in the foot beneath the table and the first thing I could to was laugh as I looked back at Theresa, "Er, yeah. Jack completely won me over when we first met."  
Jack laughed heartily.

The expression on Theresa's face was absolutely heavenly. Her smile had turned from broad and bragging into small and tightlipped as her eyes hardened and her hair seemed to fall out of its twist at the back of her head. It was glorious. But she recovered quickly, "And how do you fall into this, Brown Eyes?" she smiled cutely at the Doctor.  
"Oh, I'm their best friend – going to be both the best man and maid of honor. My wife can't make the wedding though, unfortunately. She just adores functions that involve floral arrangements."

My bladder was going to explode I was holding back so much laughter. Jack was getting closer by the second. By the time the Doctor had finished his sentence he and I were staring into each other's eyes, nearly nose to nose. I couldn't focus on anything. His face turned into a pretty Picasso as I tried to keep my eyes from crossing as he lovingly rubbed my shoulder and neck.

"Well, aren't we lucky girls, Alice?" Theresa said.  
I turned away from Jack's face and smiled, "Very lucky. Congratulations to you again Theresa. I hope you and Greg are very hap-aaah!" Jack was kissing my neck. I giggled stiffly and pushed his head away.  
"You too," Theresa's smile was off her face and her eyes were steel. "I'll give you a few minutes to decide what you'd like." she stalked off before she'd finished the sentence.

I was busy fending off Jack as the Doctor watched her go into the kitchen and out of sight. "Alright, let's go," he said, taking my hand and dragging me out of the booth.  
Jack came right with us as Theresa walked back out of the kitchen. At the sight of her he grabbed hold of my arm and pulled me into the tightest and most inescapable kiss I'd ever participated in. Not that it wasn't great, of course but I could feel the Doctor rolling his eyes at the doorway.

After he let me go he grinned mischievously, as he bent down, seized me around my legs and picked me up like a sack of potatoes so my upper half was hanging over the back of his shoulder and he put his arms around my legs to keep me stable. I was still in a daze from the kiss so I didn't protest much as he picked me up.  
I yelped. "Good to meet you Theresa," I heard Jack say and he turned around and moved towards the door.  
I smiled and waved at my now very ugly looking old school mate as I was carried out the door.

--

Jack carried me all the way back into the TARDIS and didn't set me down until we were back inside on the ramp. I'd been laughing the entire way and when I was placed on my feet again I attacked the Doctor with a great hug and a kiss on the cheek. "You _are_ brilliant," I said to him. He giggled as he held me, "It's been a while since I've done that."  
"I bloody love you two," I said as I hugged Jack, who tried to kiss me again but with a warning look from the Doctor, didn't follow through with it.

I sighed contentedly as I sat down. The Doctor was at the controls, probably setting in a new destination. "Where are we going now?"  
The Doctor looked at me for a long moment before he spoke, "Jack needs to get back home and you wanted to go back to yours as well."

I sank a little into my seat. The way he spoke it sounded like it wasn't negotiable, so I stayed silent.  
"What is it, Alice?" Jack said.  
"It's nothing. I was just thinking about something I talked about with the Doctor a while ago, about being afraid." I spoke to Jack but my eyes continued to flick to the Doctor for any reaction. There was none. "I was hoping that I could get a second chance maybe."  
The Doctor glanced up at me then, "A second chance at what?"  
"Going to 1977 to see _Star Wars_ with you and maybe go on from there," I stood and walked towards him like a tentative puppy.

The Doctor looked at me seriously, placing his hands in his pockets.  
"If you don't want me to, I – "  
"It's my turn," he said and I went silent.  
"It is such a bore," he said and my heart sank even more. "To go to the theater by yourself." His eyes sparkled and a sweet smile came to his lips. "It's much more fun to have someone there to discuss the aspects of the film with afterwards."

"So, you'll take me with you?" I asked slowly, barely able to believe that he'd be considering it at all.  
"You know me, Alice and you know I'd love it," he said with a laugh and his boyish smile.

I let out a scream that seemed to scare him a little and jumped up and down until I jumped onto him with my second grateful hug for him within five minutes while kissing him repeatedly on the cheeks.  
"I never get that," Jack said wistfully.  
"You never give me enough notice," the Doctor replied without missing a beat as I let him go and made my way back to my seat as the TARDIS started up again.

The Doctor sat down next to me and Jack leaned on the console in front of us.  
"One thing that's been driving me crazy, Alice – that song you sang, where exactly is it from?"  
"Oh, come on!" the Doctor and I said at the same time.

"You're kidding right? I thought you were from Earth," I said.  
"Well, there is no place like home," the Doctor said to me.  
I nodded, "With its rain clouds that bring rainbows."  
"Big _and_ little people –"  
"Scarecrows in the fields and lions in the forests – " I added.  
"Oh, good one! Real witches and imaginary ones – "  
"Sometimes it can turn from black and white to color – "

"This isn't helping," Jack cut off our banter.  
The Doctor was scratching his head in disbelief, "Maybe we should take a detour to 1939 first."  
"_The Wizard of Oz_!" Jack said triumphantly with bright eyes.  
I laughed, "Maybe we could try _Gone With the Wind_ too – "

The ship gave a shudder, rocking the Doctor and me to the side in our seats and causing Jack to stumble and nearly fall on top of us.  
"Is that normal?" I said.  
"Not exactly," the Doctor sat up and Jack was already at the controls.

"The course has changed but I can't tell – "  
Another crash rattled us in the room and tipped me out of my seat, the Doctor landing partially on top of me, smashing my face into the metal mesh flooring. I let out a groan and for some reason the thought came into my head that I was closer to entering OZ than I was going home.

--

Author's Note:  
Before anyone asks I'm not considering shipping Alice and Jack or anyone else for that matter. That could change but for now, no shipping, I swear! This is my favorite of the series so far because the entire time I was writing it I just pictured David Tennant doing all of this stuff, acting like a woman was inside his body, his arms flailing and all of that.  
Thanks for reading and to those of you who took the time to post your comments and reviews - you have no idea how encouraging they are :)  
The next adventure _Story Tellers_ will be posted soon.


End file.
